Lifestyle

Alan and Joan, 83 and 84, Live Mostly on Social Security. In Their 70s They Sold the House and Left With Several Suitcases: “I’m Not Willing to Sit in the Rocking Chair and Watch the World Go By”

By Erica Coleman · November 11, 2026

When Warren and Julie, the hosts of the YouTube channel Warren & Julie Travel, sat down with two of their viewers in Sicily in February 2024, they introduced a couple in their 80s who were still on the move and living predominantly on Social Security.

Asked their exact ages, Alan and Joan answered in turn: “I’m 83.” “I’m 84.” The video does not say which of them is which.

They had not settled in one country and then come home. They had sold their house more than a decade earlier and kept going.

“I’m not willing to sit in the rocking chair and watch the world go by,” one of them said. “I get bored very quickly.”

They dated the start of that life to 2012, when they were in their 70s. Joan said she was 72. Friends from church were missionaries in Kenya, and the couple decided to go see another country themselves.

“We sold the house, packed up, and in November of 2012 we had sold the home and we took several suitcases and off we went,” they said, traveling to Kenya. They stayed almost five months, volunteering with an abandoned-baby hospital and with street youth.

From there they spent a month each in Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam, then time in Spain, France and Italy, before coming back to the United States. After a health scare and a recovery, they spent a few years house-sitting, mostly in the Northwest, where they are from, and later in Canada. They also spent three years in and out of Mexico, then decided not to return and packed for Europe. When they were interviewed, they were in Sicily so Alan could see where his grandfather had come from.

This is slow travel, not a vacation circuit. One of them said the idea, at their age, is to spend at least a month, and often more, in one place and live as part of the community.

The hosts asked whether they were doing this predominantly on Social Security. “Correct,” they said. They try to keep Airbnb living expenses around 1,200 to 1,300 dollars a month.

Friends back home, some about their age, have mixed reactions. “Others are questioning our instability and our sanity, is probably what it is,” one of them said. Their adult children, they said, are not against them, but they worry.

“They are concerned about our health and they’re concerned about our safety. But I want to tell people we’re careful,” one of them said.

They also said they do not carry travel medical insurance, which they found very expensive in their 80s. One of them described a practical example: a bronchitis visit at a clinic in Spain cost about 100 dollars, plus about 30 dollars for medicine. That is their experience, not a promise of what care would cost someone else. You can hear the full conversation in their interview on YouTube.

They do not present this as a plan that will work for every retirement budget. One of them said people who want to try it need a sense of wanting to explore, a sense of adventure. They also said their doctors had given them the go-ahead and told them to keep doing what they were doing.

If you are considering a long trip in retirement, run your own numbers, including housing, health coverage and a way home if plans change, and talk with family about health and safety. Social Security can be a foundation. It is not, by itself, a travel budget that fits everyone.

This article is for general information and is not financial or travel advice. Details of Alan and Joan’s income, costs and travels are their own account from the February 2024 interview, when they were 83 and 84. This article was produced with the assistance of AI and fact-checked against the sources cited by LightWave Reports.